


The End of One Chapter

by DarkSakura



Category: Jessica Jones (Comics), Marvel (Comics)
Genre: Alias (Marvel), Comic Dialogue, Comic continuity, F/M, Marvel 616 References, Marvel Comics - Freeform, Marvel Max - Freeform, Unplanned Pregnancy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-18
Updated: 2020-04-18
Packaged: 2021-02-23 14:22:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,072
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23712910
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DarkSakura/pseuds/DarkSakura
Summary: Set at the end of the Marvel MAX title Alias (issue #28), Jessica is free of one of her ghosts. Can she live in truth now? Is she free?
Relationships: Jessica Jones/Scott Lang, Luke Cage/Jessica Jones
Comments: 14
Kudos: 11





	The End of One Chapter

**Author's Note:**

> I'm a HUGE Jessica Jones fan, ever since she was retconned into Spider-man's origin story. Alias and The Pulse are pretty much my two favorite comic series. I wanted to punch the crap out of Scott Lang, so this is me writing out my feels. I've had this in my head for a while; COVID-19 quarantine has given me the opportunity to get this drabble written.
> 
> Because this was a Marvel MAX title, there is adult language and adult situations. Some of the dialogue is directly lifted from the comic, but the exposition is mine.

Jessica couldn’t help the ugly tears and snot and everything else that came out while Carol hugged her tightly (almost too tightly, but hey, super-durability). All she could hear was her best friend repeating variations of the same content like it was a mantra.

“Jessica, you did it! You stopped him!”

Oh yeah, _this_ was ugly crying.

“Come on, Carol, let her have a few?” a familiar masculine voice said gently, and Jessica found a soft handkerchief pressed gently into he hand as Carol finally let her go.

_Who actually uses a… Oh, of course. Captain America._ It was endearing, really.

“Thank you,” Jessica managed, dabbing at her nose and eyes. She abstractly was glad to not be wearing makeup for once. Of course, the Purple Man woke her up out a sleep to kidnap her on his weird delusional mind-control “hey, let’s ruin people for fun” stroll.

Carol (as in Danvers, THE Ms Marvel), still kept a supporting arm around Jessica’s shoulders, and Jessica wasn’t inclined to have her let go. The wobbly feeling was still centered firmly in her knees and gut, and standing on her own wasn’t going to be an option for a few minutes longer.

“Remember what I told you, back at your apartment those months ago? You have the stuff. That was it,” Steve told her. Firm and gentle. What guy can sound like that all the time, angry or happy or any time? This man could, she decided.

There was that feeling again, the flash of remorse for not joining SHIELD and the Avengers when she had the chance. Another shaky sob emerged, and with practice-turned-instinct, she swallowed it down.

It didn’t taste as bitter as it once did.

“Maybe I’ll believe it this time,” Jessica replied, finally managing a real smile. “But I need to send out a few thank you cards.”

  
“So that psychic therapy helped? Jean Grey, was it?” Carol wondered, finally letting off just a little bit more.

“Yeah, from the X-men,” Jessica affirmed. _All in all, it's not a bad use of being in a coma, having psychic resistance installed into my broken-ass brain meat._

“This is _probably_ getting into private territory. We’ll take care of the crowds,” the Captain told Carol.  
  


“You should help,” Jessica said. “I need some time on my own. Promise we’ll talk.” She stepped away from Carol to prove her point.

The blonde woman’s expression was skeptical, but she nodded. “All right. Don’t go anywhere, ok?”

“Yes’m,” Jessica replied with a mock salute that earned a smirk from the two Avengers. It was probably a lie, too.

She had a pair of thoughts as she watched the two leave: Captain America has a really nice butt, and Carol’s leotard is the most ridiculous thing ever.

_No, calling yourself “The Purple Man” is pretty goddamn ridiculous, too._ She shrugged.

“Fuck him,” she said aloud, wandering over to the steps leading up to some frivolous statue, watching the various costumed heroes do their thing with the public.

There was something satisfying as the watched the Avengers work. The Purple Man was unconscious (and concussed!) in a sealed container. She’d taken a good look at his face, nose broken, eye socket probably cracked, and she smirked, even smiling in real satisfaction.

_Oh yeah,_ she thought. _I did that!_

Eventually, the costumed-types gathered around the captive Purple Man, working to get him safely locked up again somewhere he couldn’t get of this time, hopefully. It was all efficient, considering the situation they’d all just emerged from.

She wanted to do that thing once. Hell, she’d even tried it again, but it’d been ruined for her forever, to the point that putting on the costume made her skin _ache_. Now, though? Something seemed to have broken loose, and not just every ounce of mucus in her sinuses. The tight pit of ache and fear and loathing didn’t seem to hold her gut so tightly and make her chest seize. For once, she felt free.

_Free_. Holy shit.

Freedom, however, has responsibility. If there was going to be real freedom, there had to be some truth. Jessica new, however, that it was like the Gloria Steinem book title.

_The Truth Will Set You Free, But First It Will Piss You Off!_

_Oh yeah, Gloria,_ Jessica agreed. _Yes, the fuck it will. And it will hurt the hell out of people._

She knew her heart was about to get broken, even as she knew it _needed_ to be broken. This wasn't going to end well. Those footsteps approaching could be anyone’s, but she knew they were Scott Lang’s without looking. She saw the loafers before anything, almost fixed in her view. Looking up at him was a struggle, but hey, she'd decked Zebediah Killgrave in his freaky purple face. She could do this.

“Hey.”

“Hey, yourself,” Scott replied, giving her a tentative smile. “You okay?”

“You?” she retorted.

“That guy…” he trailed off.

“Yeah.” She let out a long sigh. “I hate fighting. My hand hurts and I’m… Wait, how did he escape?”

As Scott explained that The Purple Man escaped when Carnage blew the prison up, there was another sense of relief. It was just her own shitty luck, not the fact that she’d gone to get a confession from Killgrave and provoked some escape plan. Then again, Killgrave had breakfast, and then we went right to her.

Priorities.

Something, however, broke a little when Scott continued to talk about his experience under the Purple Asshole’s mind control.

“I don’t want to talk about any of this with _anyone_. What happened in my room — is that okay?” he implored.

When she’d woken up in Scott’s bed, Killgrave was waiting for her, using his powers to cause Scott to, at minimum, behave in an _embarrassing_ way. 

Wait, was he making this about him? _I just bruised my hand punching my one truest enemy into the side of a sedan, and he's worried about this?_

Jessica bit back her judgmental ire. It was a traumatic event, especially for someone who'd clearly never been in that kind of situation before, and only knew the tip of what Killgrave put her through. She relented.

“I promise,” she replied.

“Even Carol,” he insisted.

I _promise_.” Jessica repeated. _Christ on a pogo stick._

“Well, at least we got past it,” Scott continued on obliviously. “Right? I mean this was a pretty _big_ _thing_ , and _we did it_. We got _past_ it.”

_We?_ Jessica's eyes narrowed just a moment in disbelief. He laid in bed, mind-controlled into submission. _She_ was the one the Purple Man tried to torture by making people fight all around them. _She_ was the one that ended it.

_All right, it’s time,_ she realized. _The truth, right? Can you handle it?_

She took a deep breath. _Can I?_

“What?” he asked, seeing a pained expression creep into Jessica’s eyes, her face following.

“I’m pregnant. I’m three months pregnant.”

“Oh.” Scott’s eyes went wide. It was clear that this was difficult for her, and as she closed her eyes and winced, he knew. “It’s not mine.”

“No,” she confirmed. “It’s not.”

“Alright,” Scott finally said. He stood stiffly, walking away. “Bye, Jessica.”

She watched him walk off, and another knot unfurled. No, definitely not a keeper, and she knew it was for the best. Hell, she knew that if he was going to just leave her like this, then she was better off without him.

Jessica vaguely wondered if that was one of the reasons he’d been divorced.

It hurt. Oh _fuck_ , it hurt. After that initial shot of cold into her middle and the drop of her heart into that icy pit, however, she could swear the pain was already fading with every step Scott took away from her.

“That could have gone worse,” she said to no one in particular.

Okay, so sitting around her moping wasn’t going to help anyone, and Carol was busy enough. A quick text said Jessica would come by later, but she had to “Do an Adult Thing”.

This was a day for walking, not flying, for having the feeling of pavement under her feet and a regular breeze in her face. Certainly not for embarrassing semi-crash landings. No, she had to think about her next bit of truth.

_It’s the same truth, but a different delivery,_ she considered. Telling Scott was one thing, but the fact that he walked made what was going to come next much easier.

_I hope._

Jessica wasn’t remotely surprised that her wandering had her sitting on an entirely different set of stairs in front of an apartment building in Hell’s Kitchen that wasn’t her own. The sun was setting, bathing the surroundings in a lava-red glow.

_At least it’s not purple._

These were the footsteps she was waiting for. His steps were always firm and purposeful; Luke Cage was a man with a mission at all times, and he didn’t at all seem surprised to find her on his stoop.

“Well, look at you,” he said, looking up over the evening edition of The Daily Bugle.

Jessica glanced up, rolling her eyes at the headline.

**LOCAL HERO SAVES CITY FROM MANIAC**

_Oh, for fucks’ sake._

“So you’re officially the only one of us that Jameson ever writes nice shit about,” he continued, taking a seat next to her. She could feel his warmth, even though they weren’t touching.

“Wow.” What else could she say?

“That’ll be good for business.” Luke seemed rather proud of that development.

“Guess.” She shrugged, hunching over as she turned to look at him. “Luke, I…”

“So I was just going to call you,” he interrupted, glancing her way out of the corner of his eye.

Jessica raised an eyebrow. “You were?”

“I _was_ ,” he told her. “Just now. You in the mood to talk?”

Jessica winced. “Oh no. Is it bad?” The anxiety grew again, already gnawing at her brain. “Luke, I can’t — I can’t handle any more…”

What came out next was _not_ what Jessica expected. She just watched Luke as he tried to find his words.

“I seem to be thinking about you a lot,” he confessed, “more than I was admitting to myself. You know what I mean?”

Jessica didn’t know what to say. “I dunno.”

“I mean, you frustrate me. You frustrate the shit out of me. But no, let’s not get into that.”

Jessica couldn’t help but smirk as Luke _did_ get into that a bit more, but as he continued, she could feel the headache grow, reaching up to rub her temples. She wanted to look away, wanted to tell him what she knew, wanted to finally fly off and scream, but still, her eyes were trained on the self-proclaimed Hero for Hire as he (in quite the roundabout way) admitted that the tough “take no shit” unbreakable man had a soft spot for, as he called her, a “bat out of hell”.

“You like me?” she finally blurted out. _Let’s just get that out, shall we?_

“Yeah.” Luke grinned like a schoolboy with a crush.

“‘ _Like me_ ’ like me?” she pressed.

Cage smirked. “We in high school now?”

_You’re the one blushing and rambling like a kid here, Cage_ , Jessica thought. She looked away from him finally, staring at the building across the street.

“I’m pregnant.”

There. She said it. The truth.

Luke’s smile faded, his expression turning serious, pensive.

“And it’s… yours. And that’s — that’s what I came here to tell you.” A sharp breath hissed past her lips. “And that’s — yeah.”

He was quiet for a long moment, expression still thoughtful until a brilliant grin spread across his face, the dying light around them lighting his face in a way Jessica decided she’d never forget. He turned that brilliance towards her, that glorious smile warming another layer of her cold knot into release.

She couldn’t help but offer a weak smile herself.

“Do you want it?” he asked sincerely.

Jessica clenched her eyes shut. She truly hadn’t decided until this point, but now she knew there was nothing more certain in the entirety of her fucked-up damaged existence.

“Very, _very_ much.”

Luke reached out to pull her closer, his enormous arm covering her shoulders like a protective shield.

“Alright then,” he told her. “New chapter.”

Jessica finally let the knot go, relaxing into Luke’s arms. _New chapter, he said? Maybe this is finally 'it'._

“New chapter,” she agreed.


End file.
